Disney Infinity Goes Mobile

With less than one week left before the release of Disney Infinity, Disney has announced plans to two mobile apps that extend the franchises and gameplay of the core game. Speaking to IGN and other industry reporters yesterday, Disney representatives outlined the general plans for Infinity's mobile strategy focusing on two apps, Disney Infinity: Toy Box, due out "soon after launch," and Disney Infinity: Action!, due out this Thursday.

Speaking to the Disney representatives, this new mobile strategy allows the company to respond more quickly to changes in market taste. As mobile gaming comes to stand alongside console gaming the market, Infinity will have an established presence in both worlds and can grow toward whichever platform shows the most potential. More than that, the tablet app allows Disney to introduce brands without the significant investment of time and resources required to manufacture toys. Rather than waiting the six to twelve months required to get new playset toys for the console version to market, the Disney mobile app can introduce new content much more quickly and much more cheaply.

The Toy Box app, exclusive to the iPad, reproduces the toy box experience, sans multiplayer, of the console version. Played either as a stand-alone experience, or synched with the console version via a free Disney ID, Toy Box gives players the full suite of editing and play tools present in the user-created sandbox mode. All the editing is uploaded via Disney ID and becomes instantly available on either platform.

The initial download contains just a single character, Mr. Incredible, along with around 60 basic items including trees, basic building blocks, and a car. Additional content can be unlocked through playing the console game, through digital codes that come with the physical toys, or, of course, in-app purchases.

Exit Theatre Mode

The second app, which works for both iPhone and iPad, is Disney Infinity: Action!, which gives users the power to create and share their own videos using animated overlays of three characters: Sully, Jack Sparrow, and Mr. Incredible. Each character comes with multiple actions -- Sully jumps out and strikes a terrifying pose, Mr. Incredible flexes his muscles, etc -- which can be framed against a real life backdrop to integrate that action into whatever scene is being filmed. Sharing those videos on social media gives players coins they can use to unlock further actions.

Disney's already broken its rule on cross-brand interactions with Infinity, and it seems as if it will be much more permissive in the use of these characters in user-created videos. Responding to a question about potential copyright claims on YouTube, the game developers assured us that Disney's legal team has already signed off on these characters for user-created content. Just how far they're prepared to tolerate deviant contexts remains to be seen.